There's No Escaping It
by SpPandaaa
Summary: Yao spent his time trying to avoid Ivan to the best of his ability, but he soon enough realizes there really is no escaping the Russian. And when he acknowledges that, that's when the real story begins. RoChu.
1. Chapter 1

**Title:**  
There's No Escaping It

**Author:**  
LoveAnime18

**Rating:**  
PG-13

**Warnings:  
**Gakuen AU. Human Names.

**Notes:**  
My contribution to the RoChu Secret Santa. My recipient was dare_de_chu_ka over at LJ. Her request was a Gakuen verse RoChu fic, but I included a bit of her second prompt of kid!RoChu as well.

* * *

_The doorbell rang, and the little boy shot up from his seat at the table, and got up to run to the door. It was almost three o'clock to that meant his friend from next door would be at the door. Every Saturday this is what he looked forward to. _

_"Yao, you didn't finish you lunch," the boys mother said. _

_"I'll finish it in a bit. I need to let Ivan in," Yao exclaimed, and his mother just sighed. A boy filled with that much energy was a good sign for being a healthy young boy she supposed. Besides she knew Yao always stood by his word, so she had no problem believing him when he said he would come right back to finish it. _

_Yao open the door cheerfully, to see his Russian companion, Ivan Braginski standing at the door with a forlorn expression on his face. _

--

Beep. Beep. Beep.

Yao grumbled, and reached his arm out to turn off his alarm. He just laid in his bed under the covers for about five minutes until he felt a slight nudge at his side. Yao peeked from under his covers to see his pet panda, Panda-chan staring at him. Yao sighed, and forced himself out of bed. After five years of taking care of this panda, he knew pretty much what he was thinking. And right now, he knew his panda wanted food.

He took some bamboo out of a container, and then fed it to his pet panda. Yao sat back down on his bed and watched Panda-chan as he ate his bamboo. In the back of his mind Yao thought about his dream. It has been a long time since he had dream about Ivan.

Yao grunted disapprovingly, and of course it had to be a bad memory of him. Then again, it was hard to remember the good memories with Ivan with the way he treated him at the end.

Yao glanced over to the clock. 6:39.

Yao figured he better get ready, since Yong Soo was going to be showing up his door any moment now telling him to come out, so they could have breakfast together. Yao made his way over to his closet and took out his uniform. He made sure to quickly get out of his pajamas, and into his uniform since Yong Soo liked to open his door unexpectedly while changing. Yao changed the lock many times, but Yong Soo still managed to open his door, so Yao has given up on changing his locks and just makes sure to change at rapid speed.

When he had his changshan and pants on, he walked over to the mirror to make sure everything was on properly, after his brief inspection he slipped on the school sweater vest.

Yao quickly walked over to his door, and opened it to make sure no one would be unexpectedly swinging his door open. Yong Soo was nowhere insight. Yao took this as a blessing from the sky, and continued to get ready.

When Yao was fully finished getting ready, he quickly glanced over to the clock again. 7:34. He wondered if he should be worried about his Korean companion, but quickly shrugged off the feeling. Yao felt a tug on his pant leg, when he looked down he saw Panda-chan done eating, and picked him up and placed him into his basket, which Yao then strapped onto his back.

_Maybe Yong Soo is already at the cafeteria_, Yao thought to himself, and opened his door. Right when he opened the door he heard the door to his left open as well.

"Yao~✩" Yao heard his neighbor say enthusiastically.

Yao turned his head to see his Russian neighbor, Ivan Braginski smiling at him, the same Ivan who was his childhood friend from all those years ago. Ivan was very different. He was no longer short and slightly pudgy, but rather tall and big-boned. Ivan far surpassed Yao in height now. He remembered being eye level with the Russian as kids, and now he had to constantly look up to him, which he found slightly irritating.

"Hello Braginski," Yao responded.

"Yao, why are you so cold? We're friends, da?" Ivan asked. Yao honestly didn't know how to classify Ivan. Would he call him a friend now? Yao has all these memories of Ivan, and yet Ivan doesn't seem to remember him at all. Did Ivan consider them friends as a child? Or did he simply forget him? Would Ivan forget him again when they parted ways again? Yao was pretty sure he couldn't handle the heartbreak if it happened again, that's why he spent all his time trying to avoid Ivan.

--

_"Aniki! Aniki!" Im Yong Soo's voice echoed throughout the house, as he ran up the staris to Yao's room. When he swung the door open he saw Yao laying in bed. Yong Soo could see it in his eyes, Yao's body was awake, but his mind was not. Even though his eyes were wide open, there was no emotion, only emptiness and void of all emotion that Yong Soo was so used to seeing. _

_His face fell. It has been four months. Six months since Ivan has moved away and four months since Yao last heard from Ivan. And since the last letter, Yao has not been the same since. When Ivan first moved away, they Yao and Ivan kept in contact and sent letters back and forth, but suddenly Ivan stopped. Yao kept sending letters for two months, but never once got a reply. And now six months after Ivan moved, Yao was an emotional wreck. He didn't want to do anything. He didn't have the energy to do anything. He was not the aniki he loved anymore. _

_Yong Soo's fist clenched. If he ever saw Ivan Braginski, he made sure that he was going to punch him square in the face for what he has done to aniki. This wasn't fair. He couldn't bare to see what Ivan Braginski was doing to him. _

--

But even after all that has happened to Yao, for some reason he was not able to break free from Ivan's grasp. Ivan was in almost all of his classes, so he couldn't escape him in the daytime, and then after class when Yao thought he would be safe, it turned out he was not when he learned Ivan was his neighbor. As if Francis being his next door neighbor already in room 69 wasn't enough.

Yao looked up at Ivan. Different, yet still the same. He still had the same innocent face, and even though he didn't remember Yao, he still clung to him over anyone else. A sense of nostalgia rushed through Yao's body. He didn't want that rush. He didn't want to remember. It was painful to remember everything, and seeing Ivan right in front of him, and doing nothing.

"I guess so, aru," Yao replied. To be honest, he had no idea why he said that. Maybe Yao was slightly masochistic. Actually, that had to be it. For him to accept all the torture that Ivan had put him through then let him do some more damage, it was completely masochistic though he had no idea why he did it. Only with Ivan did he do this. If anyone else did this to him, Yao wouldn't have accepted it.

Ivan smiled and hugged Yao tightly, "That's the first time you said we're friends Yao."

It became apparent to Yao that there was a part of him that still clung to Ivan as well. Part of him wanted Ivan to still be in his life. He didn't want to give him up, and he was willing to go through all sorts of abuse and punishment for it.

* * *

_Extra Notes_

[1] A _changshan_ is probably better known to the English speaking world as Mandarin or Chinese shirt.

[2] I tried to keep as much as the canon of the Gakuen verse by Himaruya as I could (while completely eliminating the fact that they're countries), so I included the panda, who has been affectionately named, Panda-chan for this fic.

[3] Yao distrustfulness towards Ivan mirrors China's distrustfulness towards Russia in the canon after the Sino-Soviet split. You see what I did there.

[4] The fact he's willing to put the past behind is to mirror the reestablishment of relations between China and Russia after the fall of the Soviet Union.

[5] France's dorm room number was totally ripped from my Gakuen RPG with some friends. Let's face it, that's too hilarious to pass up. There are a few things in this fic that is ripped from that RPG actually.


	2. Chapter 2

**Title:**  
There's No Escaping It

**Author:**  
LoveAnime18

**Rating:**  
PG-13

**Warnings:  
**Gakuen AU. Human Names.

**Notes:**  
Continuing my contribution to the RoChu Secret Santa. My lovely recipient is still dare_de_chu_ka on the LJ. I'll come back and edit any off grammar this have fic has. This part is much longer than the last, so this should hopefully appease you guys a bit more. There's one more part after this.

* * *

It's been a few months since that faithful morning Yao and Ivan established their mutual friendship. Yao only wished he could call it stable, he has been doing nothing but hiding his friendship with his Asian siblings. Yong Soo went ballistic at the very mention at Ivan's name, so Yao couldn't very well tell them that he was friends with him once again.

Yao made sure to get up early to meet with Ivan in the morning; he would then part ways and meet up with Yong Soo for breakfast, and then meet up with Ivan again in class. Since they had almost all their classes together, Yao got ample time with Ivan during the school day. He would then run off to meet his Asian siblings, and did something productive like homework, or went out to eat. After that, Yao would retire to his room, where he would see Ivan once more before calling it a night, and repeating the cycle the next morning.

It was tiring, yes. But Yao was willing to do this day in and out for Ivan. It was a gnawing feeling inside of Yao that urged him to go day in and day out following this schedule, making sure not to make the slightest change at all.

"Yao, you mentioned having a big family before, da?" Ivan asked as he was leaning on the coffee table in front of him. Yao turned around from the coffee maker—which he used to boil water to make tea—to face Ivan. His face was covered in curiosity.

"Only Mei and Xiang are blood related to me, but I grew up with Yong Soo, and Kiku and they're children of close family friends, so I'm like a big brother to them, aru," Yao explained.

"They sound like nice people from your stories~" Ivan smiled. "They go to school here, da?"

"Everyone, but Xiang, aru. He's starting next year," Yao replied.

"Could I meet them?" Ivan asked.

"No!" Yao replied a bit too quickly. "I mean—I would prefer it if you didn't. At least for now, aru."

Allowing Ivan to meet anyone in his family would be catastrophic and who knows what will happen when Ivan and Yong Soo meet. Yao didn't even want to think about it; just hope for the best and in the remaining year and a half left at World Academy.

Yao hesitantly looked back into Ivan's gaze. He seemed more confused than anything else, which Yao figured it was probably the result from his outburst. Something Yao couldn't blame him for being confused by.

Yao was happy when he eventually saw Ivan shrugged, and completely dropped the meeting family topic. Yao poured some tea for him and Ivan and sat across from him at the coffee table and gave him his cup of tea.

"You'll just have to meet my sisters instead then," Ivan said abruptly, which caused Yao to almost spit his tea out.

From what he could remember when they played together as kids, his older sister, Katyusha was nice enough, but his younger sister, Natalia was crazy. She would always give him these death glares whenever Yao went over to their house, and would shove him away from Ivan when they "got too close." Yao subconsciously shuddered at the thought of meeting Natalia again. But that wasn't the only reason; Yao was lucky that Ivan didn't remember him, but what about his sisters. If they recognized him then it was game over, and their friendship would come to a complete halt.

Yao knew he had to prevent himself from meeting Ivan's sisters and Ivan from meeting his family. _"It's only going to get tougher from here on out,"_ Yao thought to himself.

Yao didn't really how much tougher it was going to get in the time span of ten minutes when he heard a knock on the door. He got up from his seat, and when he opened the door, there was Yong Soo standing right before him.

"Yong Soo!" Yao said in a surprised tone.

"Hey Aniki," Yong Soo greeted, ignoring Yao's shock. Quickly Yao pushed Yong Soo out of the doorway and slammed the door behind him. This wasn't good. He never thought Yong Soo would come to his room after spending the entire afternoon with him. Yao cursed under his breath unsure of what to do.

"Is there something wrong Yao?" Ivan asked.

"Not at all, aru," Yao replied.

Ivan narrowed his eyes, and gazed right back into Yao's golden eyes. Yao could tell with that way that Ivan was staring at him that he didn't believe his lie and knew something was up.

"Tell me the truth Yao," Ivan said sternly.

"It's nothing you need to concern yourself with, really, aru" Yao said.

"Jao," Ivan said gravely, which made Yao jump at his foreign sounding name. He only called him that when he was getting irritated. "I don't like being lied to."

"I-" Yao was interrupted by banging on his door.

"Aniki. Why did you slam the door on me?" Yao heard Yong Soo yell from the other side of the door as he continued to pound the door like no tomorrow.

"Ivan, I don't have time to explain, aru," Yao said, rushing over to Ivan. "I just need to get you out of here. _Now._"

"I don't understand Yao," Ivan said in a confused tone, anger subsided.

"Just trust me, please, aru," Yao said.

Ivan stared at Yao once again, eventually he gave a nod in agreement, "Ok, but you promise to explain later, da?"

"Of course," Yao replied. He wasn't sure how exactly he was, but Yao was sure he could think of something that wouldn't be an outright lie, but not exactly the full truth later on.

Just as Ivan was getting up, Yao heard a loud thump behind him. He hoped to god that wasn't what he thought it was. Slowly, Yao turned around to see Yong Soo at the standing where his door used to be; he slowly looked down to see his door in the floor. At the quick glance he took at it, he could tell right away he was going to need new hinges for his door.

"Aniki are you alright?!" Yong Soo exclaimed.

"What the heck Yong Soo?! You broke my door, aru!" Yao yelled. Obviously, Yong Soo was spending too much time with that America, Alfred since Alfred was notorious for breaking down doors in their school.

"But you slammed the door on me, so I thought something was wrong," Yong Soo replied. Ok maybe slamming the door on Yong Soo's face wasn't the best idea. He had an overactive imagination, and knowing him, Yong So probably thought he was being attacked by rouge ninjas or something.

"Yao is this one of your siblings?" Ivan asked, standing up to get a better look at the new guest inside his friend's dorm room. Yao quickly turned around to Ivan, he forgot about him for that split second while talking to Yong Soo.

"No one you need to concern yourself with, aru," Yao said.

"What are you talking about Aniki? Your b-" Yong Soo stopped mid-sentence when he had a look at Ivan's face. Yong Soo's fist clenched, and gave the nastiest glare to Ivan.

"What's your name?" Yong Soo asked in a dangerously low tone.

Ivan stared at him for a minute, and smiled ignoring the obvious threatening-look Yong Soo was trying to impose on the Russian, "Ivan Braginski."

At that moment, Yong Soo charged Ivan and tackled him to the ground.

"Yong Soo! What on earth do you think you're doing, aru?!" Yao exclaimed, trying to tug the Korean off his Russian companion. Yao was hoping that Yong Soo wouldn't recognize Ivan; of all people he wanted Yong Soo to not realize this was his childhood friend. Over the years, Yong Soo always said the first thing he would do the next time he would meet Ivan would be punching him square in the face.

"Aniki! Don't you realize who this is?!" Yong Soo exclaimed.

"Yong Soo, you're acting childish, get off of Ivan immediately, aru!" Yao demanded.

"No Aniki! He's the one who broke your heart! How can you give him this opportunity again?!" Yong Soo yelled.

"What exactly are you two talking about?" Ivan asked, obviously unaffected that he was pinned to the ground. It was apparent that Ivan was not using any of his strength at all. If he really wanted to, he could push Yong Soo off him, and cause some real damage, but he knew this was a special person to Yao, so he didn't want to hurt him.

"Don't act stupid!" Yong Soo replied angrily. "You were the reason Aniki was depressed for so long!"

"Yong Soo, that's enough, aru," Yao said.

"No it's not Aniki. How can you stand by and let him hurt you again?" Yong Soo asked.

"I'm not sure what you're talking about. I only met Yao when I came here to World Academy," Ivan said.

"Cut the crap! I know you're lying!" Yong Soo yelled.

"Yong Soo, get off of Ivan now, aru," Yao said, sternly.

"Not until he admits to the horrible things he's done to you!" Yong Soo said angrily.

"I'm not sure what exactly I did wrong comrade," Ivan said calmly. "You can explain what I did wrong, da?"

"That's it!" Yong Soo yelled, as he raised his fist, and just as he was about to punch Ivan in the face, he found himself thrown back and laying on the floor with Yao on top of him.

"Aniki what are you doing?!" Yong Soo exclaimed.

"Stopping you from doing something stupid, aru," Yao explained. "Do you really think you can hurt Ivan? You'll be the one in the nurse's office if you escalate this fight any longer."

"But Aniki-" Yong Soo started.

"But nothing!" Yao interrupted. He got off from Yong Soo and eyed him until he got up from the floor. "Now go back to your room. I'll talk to you later."

"Aniki-" Yong Soo said weakly.

"GO!" Yao yelled at the top of his lungs, and at that Yong Soo ran out the room. He knew Yao had very good patience. After all, Yao did put up with him, but Yong Soo knew once Yao's patience was running thin, he should not test his luck since Yao went pretty insane whenever he got pissed off.

Once Yong Soo left, Yao sighed, and hesitantly looked back at Ivan. What could he possibly tell him? With Yong Soo's actions it was going to be hard to come up with a story to explain everything that just unfolded. Ivan would surely want some answers, especially answers to what Yong Soo was going on about.

"Ivan are you ok, aru?" Yao asked. That was one place to start.

"I'm fine," Ivan replied. "But what was your brother going on about? Did I hurt you in someway the past couple of months?"

"No, you didn't. I can assure you that, aru," Yao replied, as he grabbed Ivan's hand. Ivan gripped Yao's hand, and gazed into his eyes.

"Tell me Yao, what was your brother going on about?" Ivan asked. "And don't lie to me. I'll know if you're lying or not."

There really was no way around it now. Yao had to tell the truth, and come clean. Something he probably should have done from the start. Yao looked back into the Russian's eyes; nervousness was written all over his face. It was now or never Yao supposed.

"Ivan, I've been deceiving you this entire time, aru," Yao said. Ivan gave him a curious look, but said nothing, and waited for Yao to continue. "I led you to believe that the first time we met was here at World Academy, but the truth is when we were children we were very close friends."

"Why keep something like that from me Yao?" Ivan asked.

"I was afraid what would happen if you knew," Yao replied. "At first I completely avoided you since I didn't want to face you, but soon enough I realized you didn't recognize me, which did hurt, but I thought it would just make avoiding you easier then, aru."

"What made you change your mind?" Ivan asked.

"A few months ago when you asked if we were friends, and it made me realize that I still wanted to be friends with you, aru," Yao answered. "At that moment I didn't care anymore that you moved away and stopped sending me letters. I just wanted to be with you again."

Before Yao knew it, Ivan grabbed Yao's arm, and tugged him closer to him, so that he was in his embrace. Ivan wrapped one arm around Yao's small body and the placed his free hand on his head. Yao couldn't see it, but he could feel the Russian's happiness; he could feel Ivan's smiling face on his head.

"Yao, Yao, Yao," Every time Ivan said his name his voice got happier and happier. "Моё золотце"

At that, Yao was filled with overwhelming happiness; "Моё золотце" was the nickname Ivan used for him as kids. Ivan did remember.

"I've been looking for you for a very long time," Ivan said. "I'm sorry for not recognizing you, Моё золотце."

"You remember, and that's all that matters," Yao smiled, and that's how he honestly felt. Yao was just happy to know that he wasn't just some passing friend, someone who meant something to Ivan; that Ivan treasured their friendship as much as Yao did.

* * *

_Extra Notes_

[1] Had to give unnamed countries some names so here we go:

+ Taiwan - Mei

+ Hong Kong - Xiang

+ Ukraine - Katyusha

[2] Моё золотце translates literally as "My Gold" but can also translate as "My Dear" and "My Precious."


End file.
